Flirting With Pete: A Novel (6 page)

The opposite room was his. She sensed it as she approached, saw it in the more worn look of the carpet at one end. The door was only barely ajar. Feeling like an intruder now, she pushed it a bit and peered around the doorjamb. The light was bright from windows front and back, but it fell on an interior that was decidedly dark. She stayed only long enough to make out potted trees by the windows, a heavy sleigh bed, a sitting area, a pair of dressers, and the bathroom door. Ducking back out and feeling instantly safer, she turned away and climbed to the next floor.

There were no plants on this landing, but rather a single oil painting of a woodland scene, yet another staircase, and two closed doors. Opening one, she found a guest bedroom done in lilac— twin beds, a dresser, a love seat. The room’s main order of business, though, was storage. Cartons and storage bins filled most of the space. She found more of the same across the hall in a room done in beige. Since the beds here were bunked, there was even more storage space, and it was used.

Casey was mildly daunted by the sheer number of boxes. Connie’s active files had been given to a colleague, but she suspected that an impressive number of books and papers remained here. The woman who had idolized him as a professional wondered whether he had left instructions for bequeathing his papers to a library. The woman who was dying to know the man himself wondered if there were personal items mixed in.

She would look. She would have to. Even if she weren’t curious, she couldn’t sell the place until all of this was disposed of one way or another.

Closing the door of the second room, she mounted the final staircase. Steeper than the others, it led to the cupola that she had admired from the street.

Here was a totally different feel, a small but open space with a domed roof, exposed rafters, light oak beams, and glass front and back. She looked out over the front of Leeds Court for a minute, before turning around to the back of the house. Behind a trio of potted ficus trees, a single sofa gazed out through glass sliders at a deck. The sliders were open; screens covered the space. Crossing the bare wood, she eased one screen aside and stepped out. The deck couldn’t have been more than twelve feet by twelve feet. It was floored with cedar planks and fenced in by a waist-high wall of the same. Plants and flowers were in abundance in long earthenware pots and in ceramic bowls glazed multiple shades of green. In their midst was one sad patio chair.

Casey was struck by the loneliness of it.

Chasing away a chill, she focused on the view. Treetops spread beneath her; neighboring decks lay on either side. Ahead, colored lime by trees, deep green by ivies, and reds and pinks by flowers and patio umbrellas, a succession of rooftops climbed east up Beacon Hill.

A man stood on one. When her eye reached him, he waved. She smiled and waved back, then turned and faced her own house.

Her own house
. That’s what it was— for a short time, at least. The deck had potential and would surely increase the resale value. Add a grill, a table and chairs, and a handful of standing torches, and she couldn’t think of a better spot for a party. Of course, Connie hadn’t been a partyer. That was one of the many ways in which they differed.

She did have his hair, though Meg Henry couldn’t possibly know that. The man had died at seventy-five, and for the last fifteen of those years, what little hair he’d had was white. For a long time before that, though, it had a blond sheen to it, and, way back, even before that, according to Casey’s mother, it had been Casey’s own strawberry blond.

Casey also had Connie’s blue eyes. But she had her mother’s eyesight, which was perfect. So, while Casey had never worn glasses, Connie wore thick ones that had muted the impact of his blues and made them look less like hers as well.

Inside again now, she started down the stairs. The closed doors on the third floor were a challenge indeed. She wondered if there were pictures of a young Connie in the boxes stored there. She wondered if there were pictures of long-lost relatives or of the farm in Maine where he’d grown up. His official biography offered little more information than the state and the date. She knew about a farm because it was one of the few things her mother had ever shared— and that, done only to explain comparing the man’s social grace to that of a donkey.

Caroline Ellis wasn’t a bitter woman. The only times she had expressed her opinion of Connie was when Casey pushed her to it— and then, yes, she was biased, as she had a right to be. The man had loved her and left her, not so much denying that a relationship had taken place as seeming oblivious of it. Caroline had never asked for his help, but she would have been grateful if it had been offered. Once Casey was grown and self-supporting, Caroline had had no use for the man.

Casey had grudges of her own. But there was a blood connection between Connie and her. That primal link justified her curiosity.

She found it interesting that these boxes were packed up and hidden away behind closed doors in a place where anyone could pass by without seeing them. Some men of Connie’s stature would want to advertise their treasures, but that wasn’t him. He might be self-absorbed and myopic, but he wasn’t arrogant. She had to give him that.

Then again, it was possible that he was the only one who ever climbed these stairs. Between the sofa behind its little wall of potted trees and the single chair outside, the place was the perfect spot for a lonely man to look out at a world he couldn’t access.

That said, Casey refused to feel sympathy for him. If Cornelius Unger had been lonely, she decided as she headed downstairs, he had no one but himself to blame. He’d had a wife whom he ignored. He’d had colleagues who might have been friends as well, had he given them the slightest encouragement. He’d had a daughter who would have come running at the first invitation, and
that
was the truth, much as she hated to admit it. She might resent him, but she would have been there in a minute had he called.

Feeling a great sadness, she trotted down again to the second floor. If Connie had been a different kind of man, she might have imagined that he had done up the blue bedroom for her. The only way he could have known blue was her color, though, was if he had given her a look now and again.

Skeptical of
that,
she continued on down to the front foyer. Taking the hall on the left, she found the kitchen through an archway at the end. In stark contrast to the living room, it was open and bright, with white walls, white tile floors, and cabinets and tables of oak. The work area faced the back of the house, with sink and cabinets built around mullioned windows that were cranked open now, letting in a light breeze. An eating area sat before tall windows that looked over the front-yard trees.

The table was round, with four captain’s chairs comfortably spaced. The chairs had cushions done in a large green and white check, a pattern that was repeated in café curtains, a basket filled with napkins, and a toaster cover.

Casey was more comfortable in this room than in the others, although she guessed that it in part had to do with the smell of fresh coffee in a pot on the work island. Spotting a mug tree, she dropped her gum in a basket under the sink and poured herself a cup of the brew. She took several sips as she stood at the front window, looking out over the large rings of the café curtains. She imagined her father had often stood like this, half hidden here as he was on the attic sofa, wanting to see the world without being seen.

On impulse, she pushed the rings to either side, opening the curtains wide.

Satisfied to have put her first tiny mark on the place, she left the kitchen with her coffee and headed downstairs. Watercolor seascapes hung one after another on the cream-colored walls of the stairwell; the paintings were gentle and appealing. Casey admired them until she caught the artist’s name in the corner:
Ruth Unger
. Connie’s wife. Out of loyalty to her own mother, she turned away.

Reaching the ground floor, she found a door on her right. Sensing that she was entering Connie’s professional space, she carefully tested the knob, cautiously turned it, and peered into a small reception area where patients would have waited until Connie called them in. One door led directly outside; it was locked and bolted. Another, at the opposite end of the room, led to Connie’s office.

Not quite ready for that yet, Casey went back through the hall to the room on the other side of the stairs. The door here was open. This was the den. It was a cozy place, barely half the depth of the house, with only a shallow pair of windows high on the front. There was a sheltered feel, thanks to walls of dark green, lots of deep furniture, throw pillows, and a crocheted afghan. Intermingled with shelves of books were a television and a music system.

Just then, head bowed, Meg came down the hall carrying cleaning supplies. She was nearly even with Casey when she looked up and jumped in alarm. Several moments passed before she returned from wherever her mind had been. Then her gaze fell to the mug Casey held, and she looked crushed. “You took coffee before I could ice it.”

Casey smiled. “I cooled off, so hot was fine. The coffee is wonderful.”

Meg’s face was transformed by the compliment. “I’m glad! Can I get you anything else?”

“No, thanks. I’m all set.”

“I really didn’t know he had a daughter. You don’t look any older than me, but he was
so
much older.” Her brows rose in fear; they were tinged the same auburn as her hair. “I mean, I’m not— I’m not criticizing him.”

“I know that,” Casey said gently. “I’m thirty-four. He was forty-one when I was born.”

Transformed again, Meg beamed. “I’m thirty-one. I was born in August. I’m a Leo. What’re you?”

“Sagittarius.”

“That’s
such
a good time of year. I used to make Thanksgiving dinner for Dr. Unger. I mean, he had other Thanksgiving dinners, but we always had a nice one here.”

“With his wife?”

“No. Just him. We always did it the night before, because he went up to see Ruth on the holiday itself. I always call her Ruth. She told me to. Why didn’t he have Thanksgiving with you?”

“We weren’t close,” Casey said quietly.

“Were you with your mother?”

“And friends. There were always lots of us without families.”

“That’s me,” Meg said with a false brightness. “No family but Dr. Unger.” Her brightness crumbled. “He was a kind man.” Her chin trembled. “I miss him.”

“Maybe you’ll tell me more about him sometime.” In fact, Casey thought that was an excellent idea. If a scavenger hunt of Connie’s life was the game, Meg Henry definitely held a clue or two.

Lips pressed together, Meg nodded. Still struggling with emotion, she continued through the room and went up the stairs.

Watching her, it occurred to Casey that the grief she saw in Meg might well be the greatest that had been felt for the man, which was a
totally
sad state of affairs at the end of one’s life. Casey herself might have felt sorry for Connie if there hadn’t been anger to balance it out.

Taking a breath, she sipped her coffee and turned back to the den.

This was a place of relaxation. Everything about the room told her that, yet, for the life of her, she couldn’t picture Connie here. He was a formal man. Never once had she seen him without a shirt and tie. But he couldn’t have worn those in here. One didn’t wear a shirt and tie while watching
Toy Story
or
The Last of the Mohicans
or
Sleepless in Seattle,
and those were but three of the diverse collection of videos and DVDs on his shelves. Similarly diverse was his collection of books. Mixed in with aged leather volumes was a comprehensive group of popular novels and recent works of nonfiction, all with their spines creased or dust jackets frayed. Connie had read these books. Casey shuddered to think that he had kept abreast of the world beyond his immediate life by reading books and watching movies.

Music was something else. There was a similarly used look to the LPs in the cabinet under the stereo components, but this collection was one-dimensional, fully in keeping with the elegant formality of the grand piano upstairs. Clearly, he had been a classical buff.

Casey had never in her life played either the piano or an LP. Nor was classical music her preference. She liked bluegrass.

So there was another strike against father and daughter as a compatible pair. Hair and eyes notwithstanding, they were clearly two very different people— not the least indication of which being Casey’s preference for openness and fresh air. She guessed that if his office was in the subbasement as this room was, she would find it confining.

On a wave of bravado, she returned to the hall. At the end was a direct door to the office. She opened it, slipped inside, closed it. Pulse racing, she leaned back against the door and looked around. She half expected Connie to be there, waiting, watching.

He wasn’t, of course. The office was empty. Easily the widest room in the house, it stretched all the way from one side of the building to the other. Like much of the rest of the house, it was done in dark colors and fabrics. She saw lots of wood, and shelves on every wall. Some of the shelves had cabinets built into their lower half; others went unbroken from ceiling to the floor. She caught the faint scent of wood smoke; a fireplace was nestled into the wall of bookshelves behind her, the poker now back in place with other tools on an iron rack.

On her left stood a large desk with a tall leather chair behind it. A not so large conference table stood on the right, surrounded by six wood chairs with corduroy seats. In the middle of the room was a sitting area, with a long sofa on one side, a pair of large chairs on the other side, and a square coffee table in between. The sofa and chairs were upholstered a dark plaid and, along with the coffee table, sat on a needlepoint carpet of equally dark reds, navies, and greens, but Casey’s eye didn’t linger there. Inviting as the grouping was, she looked over it to a pair of French doors that stood open. But she didn’t linger at the doors either, handsome though they were. Her gaze went right on out through them, drawn by a vision of sun, flowers, and woods.